


running away and never looking back is a viable retirement plan

by MagicalSpaceDragon



Series: chasing twisters [2]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: (it's a mess but it's complicated), Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Don't copy to another site, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:47:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28421925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalSpaceDragon/pseuds/MagicalSpaceDragon
Summary: Deadlock is a loyalson.
Relationships: Drift | Deadlock & Megatron, Drift | Deadlock/Wing
Series: chasing twisters [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2110686
Comments: 6
Kudos: 16





	running away and never looking back is a viable retirement plan

**Author's Note:**

> also while you read this i need you to understand that megatron is nearly twice this kid's height and built like a brick wall

"No," Deadlock says. He feels like he's watching his body from the outside, like he's moving his limbs and mouth with sticks like a puppeteer. "I won't."

Megatron turns slowly. His face is beyond unreadable, shrouded in darkness. They're on a stage, and the only light is a narrow beam pointed straight at Deadlock, that blinds him and makes him impossible to ignore, makes it impossible for him to hide. Everything else is pitch black, and Megatron is a great looming shadow Deadlock can't see. He only knows where Megatron is by the sound of his heavy footsteps and the way the stage creaks under his weight as he moves.

"You won't," Megatron repeats, beginning a slow circle around the light. Deadlock can picture the set of his shoulders, the length of his steps, the hard, humorless lines of his face.

"I won't," he confirms, voice betraying nothing. Fear is weakness, and weakness is something he cannot afford. Not ever, and certainly not now. "I'm done killing for you."

"Is that so," Megatron says, the neutral, even tone of a predator evaluating a prospective kill. "You would betray us like Pax?"

"No, sir," Deadlock says, forcing himself not to bristle at the mere suggestion. "The Cause is my life. I would never betray it." I would never betray  _ you, _ he doesn't say.

"You would disobey a direct order," Megatron tells him, as casually as he would chide him for bad form. He's behind Deadlock now, and Deadlock carefully stands still and does not turn to face the sound of his voice. Fear is weakness. "You would disobey  _ me." _

"I'll do anything else you ask of me," Deadlock says, calculated almost-surrender. "But I don't want to kill anyone anymore."

He doesn't realize his mistake until he hears the sneer in Megatron's voice. "We all must do things we  _ don't want to _ to survive, boy. Unless you believe we would be better served by allowing our oppressors to live?"

"Of course not," Deadlock says, but his control is slipping.  _ Want, _ why would he say  _ want? _ What he wants has  _ never _ mattered. There's just what he does, what he can't or won't do, and how fast he can make the latter into the former.

"Do you  _ want _ them to live?"

"No, sir."

"Do you  _ want _ them to go free, to continue enslaving us and starving us in the streets?"

"No, sir." He clenches his hands into fists but they keep shaking.  _ Weak. Weak. He's caught you. _

The soft sound of a weapon being unsheathed is the only warning he gets before there's the very tip of a blade under his chin, tilting his head up until his neck aches. He doesn't flinch, even when he realizes the burning coals set deep into the shadow before him are Megatron's eyes.

"Do you intend to challenge me for command of the Decepticons?" Megatron asks coolly.

"No, sir." The blade bites into his skin when he speaks. A trickle of blood runs down the front of his throat.

"Do you  _ ever _ question my orders?" Megatron says, finally allowing a sliver of his anger to show. Deadlock shudders minutely and knows he's lost.

"No, sir."

"Will you  _ ever _ disobey me again?"

"No, sir."

_ "Good." _ A little flicker of happiness runs through him at even that tiny, callous scrap of approval, and he wonders, dully, what being broken feels like. "Now prove it."

A shadow that's shaped like a body is shoved into his arms, a living one, limp and defenseless but warm and breathing, he can feel their heartbeat where their bare skin meets his. He can't see them, can't see their face, but it doesn't matter. He knows how to do this by touch alone.

They jerk and struggle in his arms, trying to get free, even though he tries to make it quick. They don't beg for mercy, at least, just wheeze and gurgle around his knife in their back, and there's so much blood, there's always so much blood, and the  _ smell, _ and they look up at him with empty eyes and a mouth pooling out red and they clutch at his shoulders and shake him and hiss his name—

_ "Drift!" _

He opens his eyes and there's still only darkness. He's on his side, prone, vulnerable—tangled in something, he can't move, he can't get free—

"Drift, you're safe!" He  _ knows _ that voice.

"Light," he sobs, stupid and weak weak  _ weak. _ "Please,  _ light." _ It doesn't matter what he wants, just what he can pay for it with. Anything. Anything, anything they ask for, anything they want,  _ please— _

A soft yellow mote of light flickers into existence, cupped in Wing's hands.

Drift breathes.

Slowly, Wing sets the light to hang in the air between them, and slowly he reaches out to Drift.

"You're safe," he says, brushing some of the hair from Drift's face. "You're in Crystal City. You're safe here, no one is going to hurt you."

Drift tries to swallow around the knot in his throat. No. No,  _ being _ hurt isn't what he's afraid of. "Are you bleeding?"

Wing doesn't quite wince. "My back. You were..."

He can feel the blood under his fingernails. "Let me see."

"Don't." Drift sits up, pushes at his shoulder urgently, and despite protesting Wing lets himself be turned so Drift can judge the damage.

"Drift, it can  _ wait," _ Wing says like an idiot as Drift staggers to his feet to find the kit they keep on-hand for sparring injuries. Drift ignores him all the way back to the bed, and then his attention is entirely on his work.

His hands won't stop shaking as he tries to clean the— _ claw marks, _ practically. He can kill a grown man while looking him in the eye and  _ this _ is where he falters? This is where he feels like he can't move, like he's going to break down any second? Here, safe, trying to  _ fix _ the damage he's done for once, and even this one little thing he can't—

Wing catches his hands so, so gently.

"I'm alright," he says softly. Drift nods, letting the small circles Wing is making with his thumbs ground him. "What do  _ you _ need right now, Drift?"

He ducks his head. "I—I don't know."

Wing hums and squeezes his hands, once, just to let him know he heard. "Alright. What do you  _ want?" _

That's even worse. He shakes his head mutely.

"Do you want me to let go?"

No. No, never.

"Do you want me to keep doing this?"

Little comforting movements, warm skin against his. Such a tiny thing. Easily given. Drift wants him to keep doing that until the end of the world.

"Okay," Wing says, like it really is that simple, like Drift doesn't have to prove anything to him.

He rests his forehead on Wing's shoulder, and Wing leans into the contact.

"I don't want to train today," Drift risks. He doesn't know what he'll do if he puts a weapon in his hands with that so fresh in his mind.

"Alright," Wing says. It's not even a concession. He almost sounds pleased. Drift is sure there's a reason for that, one he'll remember when he's more awake. For now he resigns himself to focusing on the dim, cozy light and the sound of Wing's breathing.

**Author's Note:**

> POV: you're thirteen and no one and then a revolutionary picks you up off the street and gives you food and shelter and something to live for, and you spend the rest of your teenage years telling yourself that makes everything else okay


End file.
